Elowin/Backstory
Elowin is the only child of Rayner, councilor to Vulmon of the grey wizards, and Ellarian, an elvish traveler of mysterious origin. While her mother left Rayner when Elowin was still a baby, Rayner was a high member of society and bought Elowin a lavish and carefree childhood, despite her mother's absence. Elowin was very close with her father, even if he did spend long hours at his desk working or out in the field on missions for the grey wizards of Nodor. The two shared a special bond through their joint connection with magic, and Rayner took great pride in his daughter's emerging skills. Even at a young age Elowin was gifted with magic, she was able to understand the arcane scripts and symbols in her father's books and scrolls in a day rather than the months it had taken her father to understand. Magic came naturally to Elowin, and being surrounded by such strong magical auras from her father's tower and having access to his tomes of study all served to grow Elowin's power. In fact, Elowin spent most of her time in the library of her father's tower. Being more high class than most families led Elowin to have few friends so she found companionship within books and knowledge itself. Had things gone as they were planned for Elowin, it was likely she would have surpassed her father in the order of the grey wizards. But, as it so often does, life did not go as planned for Elowin. When she was 11 years old Elowin's father had started spending an increasing amount of time away from home, and when he was home he was more distant than normal. Late one night when Elowin was still up reading secretly in the library, she heard her father burst into the tower and bark orders at the servants. Rayner had ordered everyone to leave for some reason. Elowin could hear him walking hurriedly up the stairs to his office, still shouting at the servants to leave. Elowin left the library to see what was happening. Coming to his office, Elowin could hear him banging around his study muttering something about a book and not letting Vulmon get a hold of it. His muttering stopped suddenly and Elowin recognized the words for a scrying ritual being spoken, lasting only a few seconds before another sudden flurry of muttering and movement. Before she had a chance to react her father rushed to the door of his office and discovered Elowin standing there. Visibly startled by her sudden appearance, Rayner attempted to put a calm face on and tried his best to convince Elowin that everything was okay, that she just needed to go to her room for a while. Once Elowin was in her room, Rayner quickly shut the door behind her, she could hear her father muttering outside the door and scratching something in the wood of the door. She knew it was an enchantment of some sort but she had no idea what. She ran to her door and found it held fast in place, she began pleading with her father to tell her what was happening, to let her out. Her only answer was him shouting at her to be quiet as he ran off. Locked in her room and crying at this sudden and unexpected situation, Elowin was banging on her door pleading with her father to let her out until she heard an explosion downstairs. Elowin grew very quiet as sounds of shouting and magical spells being hurled around became steadily louder, until they suddenly stopped. Sounds of heavy footsteps and voices that sounded familiar came close to her room and passed by it. Elowin held her breath. Twice the voices passed her room; there wasn't another sound in the house. Eventually the voices left and didn't come back, Elowin wasn't sure how long she waited, hours, minutes, in the end it didn't really matter. Eventually Elowin gave her room door a gentle push while calling out for her father in a loud whisper. The door opened effortlessly. What greeted Elowin outside was not meant for a child's eyes. Amid the scorch marks and various magical scarring on the walls and floors were the destroyed and mangled bodies of several men in grey robes. As she moved down the tower she continued to find bodies of slain wizards who had tripped magical traps they had failed to notice. As Elowin came to closer to her father's study she began to hear voices from below her in the grand hall beneath the library. Carefully peaking over the balcony that looked over the hall, she saw five men. All five clad in grey robes, two had plain grey robes and two had accents of yellow on their robes while the last had black and red accents. Elowin recognized it as the robe of Vulmon and several other grey wizards. She heard them discussing how to deal with the mess and what to do with the bodies. Backing away from the balcony, she quietly snuck over to the door to her father's study. Her heart seemed to be trying to go the opposite way; it was beating so fast Elowin felt like it may burst from her chest at any second. The door to the office was blown open and books and sheets were strewn everywhere. Across the room from the door was the broken body of Rayner, terribly scarred from the magical skirmish. Elowin couldn't make a sound, she couldn't cry, her body just kept walking towards him on its own. Elowin's mind couldn't handle the situation. The closer she got the more her mind started to break, tears forming in her eyes, her knees beginning to quake. Elowin knew he was dead before she was even halfway across the room; the scarring was too heavy in too many places. Elowin collapsed before she could reach the body of her father. Silently crying, she continued crawling towards him. As she was about to reach out to him her eyes were caught by a book beneath his arm, clutched in a dead man's grip, that hadn't been there a moment ago. A seemingly plain book but, something about it was different than other books she had seen. This book wanted to be read, she could almost hear it crying out in her head. For a moment everything else seemed to fade from Elowin's world as this book consumed her mind. Her eyes could only look at this book, and before she knew what was happening she had pried the book from her father's dead hands and was opening it. The book flew open at her touch, rapidly turning past blank pages on its own before slowly settling on a page, which was also blank. For a moment. Suddenly the page started to haphazardly write itself as if several invisible hands were fighting over which got to write what on the page. The finished page was unlike anything Elowin had ever seen or read about in her books, her mind unable to grasp the diagrams and symbols on the page. Yet something deeper inside her knew the words. Once again her body acted on its own as she was startled to find herself chanting the words. As she did the world around her slowly came back into focus, she could see the grey wizards before her. Their movements seemed sluggish though, they seemed to be terrified of what was happening before them, and were in the process of casting spells at her. If Elowin were able to see from their view, she would have seen herself, eyes glowing and hair wiping in nonexistent wind as she chanted in a language not meant for mortal ears. The wizards seemed so small to her as she continued to watch them desperately perform hand motions for whatever spells they were trying to cast. Elowin closed her eyes. Her chanting stopped. She felt air rushing past her as a thunderous clap filled the room. Opening her eyes she saw a great tear in reality itself opening behind the wizards. The rip expanded faster than the wizards could react, it went straight through one of the grey wizards, his body falling to pieces as if severed by a blade. Before expanding further two great hands reached through the rip and grasped its edges and wrenched them open even farther. Only a moment passed before an indescribable being pulled its hulking mass out of the rip, its eyeless face turning to face Elowin. Once more time seemed to slow for Elowin as she felt a presence begin to push into her mind. She could hear her heart beating in her ears, unable move, or scream, Elowin simply sat with the book still in her hands staring at the creature. A voice rang in her head. The voice spoke of a deal that was to be made, one that was binding across realities and beyond death. Elowin couldn't think, she couldn't understand what was being said, the voice demanded an answer. Elowin's body began to shake at the enormity of the mind that was pressing down on her. Reality itself was twisting around the form of the creature. Air was turning to solid iron only to melt becoming birds that flew for but a moment before falling apart as autumn leaves that fell to the ground. The voice changed its approach, it offered her revenge. Suddenly Elowin felt herself in control again, she could feel her tears rolling down her cheeks, she could feel the vibrations in the ground and air the rip was causing, and she could feel the aching pain in her heart. Elowin looked back at her father, lying broken on the floor, anger flaring up throughout every fiber of her being at what had been done to him. She knew her answer. Elowin turned back to face the creature, her teeth clenched painfully. "Break them." A wicked smile curled up across the creatures face as it turned to the wizards who were still desperately trying to escape in slow motion. It turned to face her once again. "The deal is made." Elowin watched as a symbol began to carve itself into the forehead of the creature as it began reaching for her. A single finger touched her forehead and the greatest pain Elowin had ever known seared through her mind, body, and soul. The same symbol was being etched into her forehead by the creature. Elowin's body couldn't handle the pain, after a few moments of life muting pain, she lost consciousness. Elowin awoke hours later to the soft sound of chewing. Her eyes slowly opened to a darkened room, she felt wet and cold all over. Slowly pushing herself up and letting her eyes adjust to the dim light, she felt a sickening dread start to rise within her. The sounds of chewing continued and the room she was in started to come into focus. It was her father's office, but if she hadn't lived there her entire life she would not have recognized it. It was as if a maniac was given a brush that utterly mutated anything it touched had gone wild in the room and carelessly painted the walls and shelves with his vile brush. But more than that, there was blood. Everywhere. Looking down Elowin realized the fluid she was laying in was the blood of one of the grey wizards. The only reason she knew what the blood was coming from was because of the chest cavity still leaking blood in front of her. The sound of chewing slowly came back into focus for her. It was behind her. Dreading what she might find Elowin slowly started to turn to face the sound of the chewing. Hunched over the other half of the wizard was a shadow. The legs of the wizard hanging outt of what looked like a mouth. As she turned, the shadow stopped chewing and looked up at her. Its eyes piercing straight into Elowin's mind, a familiar symbol on its forehead glowed with a sudden arcane intensity as Elowin heard a new voice enter her mind. "Hello Elowin. I am Lucian" Elowin screamed. Her voice getting shrill as a sudden flurry of images were forced into her mind, images of the wizards being crushed, ripped, beaten apart and eaten by the two creatures who now shared a mark with her. The carnage was too much for Elowin, her eyes glazed over and she fell back out of consciousness. Lucian rose and walked over to her, looking down at this small little creature he was now bound to. He could feel all her pain and fear in her sub consciousness dreams. He curled himself around her small form. "Don't worry Elowin, you won't need to be afraid anymore" Lucian closed his eyes. "All that face you will fall, through the power given to us by Umbra, all shall fall." the symbol on his head flaring at the mention of Umbra. His voice softened, "And you will never be alone again." and then Lucian let himself fall into sleep, and began finding his way to Elowin in her dreams, to chase off the nightmares she faced.